Weird Picture!

[butlersrangers]

Skagway, Alaska, early in the 'Gold Rush' .... my! ... doesn't that look like a 'bearded' head, laying in the road?

Early Photo Bomb!

[FredC]

Not enough detail to confirm. If some weird traffic accident resulted in a decapitation, you would expect everyone nearby to be looking that way. Since most of the people in this scene do seem to be looking there, it seems that it is a real possibility that is a head in the street.

[butlersrangers]

It is probably just a 'road apple' dropped by a horse, but, much of the photographer's intent is defeated by an extraneous object in the foreground.

Kind of like feet in a gun photo!

Funny, to my warped sense of humor.

[waterman]

I have diminishing eyesight, but I agree with Fred. Most of the people in the photo seem to be looking at whatever it is. Road apples would be an every day thing, a detached head would be quite uncommon.

[MooseNugget]

Just a bunch of town folk waiting for the local animal shelter to pick up the dead dog.

Dog was rabid and shot with a Krag by a local Skagway lawyer named Atticus Finch.

[butlersrangers]

Thanks for the "Back Story", MooseNugget, aka 'Local Boy'.

Silly me, I just thought everyone was posing for the camera.

I didn't know, 'Ole Sourdough Finch' honed his skills in Alaska!

"Here Culpeper, hold my pipe ..."

[Dick Hosmer]

It's just a dog - probably sleeping!!

[butlersrangers]

Just a sleeping dog? .... Maybe it's a fox or a cat?

The detached head of a card cheat would be pretty exciting. (I obviously got a new knife, today)!

The photographer should have just cropped it out of the photo, but then, we wouldn't be paying the photo much mind, 125 years later!

[MooseNugget]

Atticus honed his lawyer skills by representing Skagway shysters such as Jefferson “Soapy” Smith. Soapy Smith is a well known character in Alaskan history who met his untimely demise at the hands of a disgruntled Skagway citizen during a gun fight.

Funny you mention “cropped photos”… I’ve seen pics of the same photo where the dead animal had been cropped out and then the photo labeled “Broadway Street, Skagway Alaska.”

[butlersrangers]

"Soapy"! .... is dat you?